When he emerges his room for breakfast the next day, there is another girl – Laura, he remembers – standing in the kitchen and making porridge.
"Morning", he mumbles, "do we have coffee?"
"Coffee?", Laura looks at him in confusion, "Like, where are you from?"
Puzzled at her reaction, Harry goes with: "Uh. Surrey. Why?"
"I've never seen an English man drinking coffee when he can have tea."
"Haven't met Luke then.", Cora chimes in happily, strutting into the kitchen and inspecting Laura's porridge. "More British than the Queen, but a horrible caffeine addict. He usually keeps it somewhere over there in the top drawer.", she says to Harry, which leaves him in a dilemma. He knows about young Muggles in college sharing basically everything from shampoo to shoes. But how does he explain to Cora that he can't simply take coffee from a boy who might take it as a very personal affront without providing any details as to why?
"Uhh, I'm not sure if I should just help myself, I mean it's a bit forward and I can't just take-"
"Don't bother with it, Potter. Next pack is on you, if we're the only ones drinking it."
Malfoy enters the kitchen with his usual nonchalant verve and even offers Harry a tight-lipped smile.
"Thanks", Harry stumbles over the word, taken aback, "Should I make a cup for you too, then?"
Malfoy's nod is more of an answer than Harry expected, and he firmly decides that he won't deal with ponderings about his strange behaviour in the vicinity of Muggles before his first cup of coffee in the morning.
Malfoy is meddling with his tie – he replaced his strange hipster clothing with his usual business casual, Harry assumes – and says to Cora: "Cora dear, how often have I told you that a green top simply doesn't go with your hair?"
She sticks his tongue out at him, but smiles and attempts to straighten his tie for him: "Darling, just because one knows how to dress, doesn't mean one has to follow it just for the sake of college like you do." She flips her hair, "It's called 'fuck yeah, alternative hair' for a reason." and ruffles his.
Malfoy lets go off his tie for her and smiles down at her with fondness in his gaze, as if she was a little kid that just learned to take his first steps.
Baffled by seeing Malfoy engaging in an affectionate discussion about hair with someone so very kind, but so very unmagical altogether, Harry almost forgets the coffee.
"Malfoy.", he says after clearing his throat and hands him his cup.
"Thanks, Potter.", Malfoy turns to Cora again, "Gotta run, see you later and then we're doing something with the two newbies here, yeah?"
"Yep.", Cora says and Malfoy storms out of the kitchen like a breezing whirlwind, with three slightly bemused people looking after him, one of them wondering how his movement would have looked like in a robe.
"God, is he always that swishy?", Laura asks and nibbles absent-mindedly at her porridge.
"Yeah.", Harry and Cora sigh in unison.
Harry immediately bites his tongue, but Cora says nothing, just looks at him with a sudden interest.
After his cup of coffee and a bit of Laura's porridge, Harry has to get running. His schedule for the day is packed tightly with lots of things like enrolling with the uni, finding out which modules to choose and which societies to join; the sort of things that can be overwhelming even if one is used to the Muggle proceedings, so Harry spends most of his time gazing at different places in the streets, and tries to blend in as far as possible by doing everything exactly like everyone else around him. He nearly passes by the Leaky Cauldron once and has to disguise himself quickly with an umbrella as the witch who is working there as a maid lately nearly runs into him.
Ginny, who is interning at the Daily Prophet, will drop some hints on his whereabouts in the papers next week, so his absence won't cause too much of a stir. Harry is forever thankful how she handled the break-up when he went to America, and how she didn't disapprove completely of all his further decisions. The same goes for Hermione, who actually encouraged him to go to university and take anthropology courses for her, so she can use his notes for her scientific approach on discovering where magic came from, and how it is developed in Muggleborns.
Ron of course, wasn't as pleased to hear that Harry would postpone his Auror training even further, but deep inside him, Harry knows he can appreciate the sentiment of being able to shine as the new war-proven prodigy of Auror squad when Harry is not around.
Fame doesn't make it exactly easy to find good friends, so Harry is proud of himself on how well he did with his and starts missing them momentarily when he sits down for card games after dinner with Cora, Laura and Draco, who he has to call Luke from now on.
"Okay then, guys!", Cora starts and smiles at the three of them with the conviction of someone who sees a pleasant evening with lots of joy ahead, whereas Laura's expression can be best described as critical wariness, all furrowed brows, and Harry's and Malfoy's best resembles a dictionary entry for 'gloomy'.
"Me and Luke have been roommates for a whole year, so I guess we know each other pretty well already, but as this can't be said for you two, Laura and Harry, we thought we'd play a simple card game with a twist. So everytime you have to take another card, you need to pull one of these slips" - she holds up an empty goldfish bowl that is filled with lots of handwritten little paper slips - "and direct the question written on it to a person of your choice. There are some personal questions in there, some stupid ones, but they're mostly just funny."
Harry sneaks little glances over to Malfoy as Cora shuffles and lays out the cards for them. Laura seems more like the quiet, observant type to him, so he doubts they'll get much out of her with this game, and he is not really sure he feels comfortable sharing, or basically lying about a personal fact about him, when he's being under Malfoy's scrutiny. Although he doubts that he really is. His presence just evokes an uneasy feeling in Harry's chest, much like a small blockade for him to breathe through.
Cora has to draw the first card and fishes after a question snippet. "Okay, I'm going to go easy on you newbies", she winks at Harry and Laura, "and ask Luke first: Luke, what would your parents have named you if you were the opposite gender?"
To Harry's surprise, a relaxed smile breaks out on Malfoy's face as he shakes his head and mutters: "You knew it was going to be something embarrassing, didn't you?"
A sly smile steals across Cora's face and Harry wonders how she managed to take the Malfoy he knew, someone bossy who needed friends who were constantly sucking up to him, and make him into what Mr Weasley would call a "good sport", who could also have the piss taken from his friends.
"Okay, so my parents, or rather my whole family has this thing where they name every other child after a constellation." Harry remembers the wall with the family tree in Sirius' house, the Order's headquarters, and a pang of melancholy hits him out of nowhere. Even in so different surroundings, Malfoy simply reminds him of everything his past held, from Sirius and the prospect of escaping his teenage prison, of the fights with Molly and how people seem to never stop caring, but the way Malfoy can talk about his past after a year gives Harry hope he will return soon and maybe get what he seems to be looking for his whole life: A family. "So, had I been a girl, my name would either have been 'Lacerta' or 'Vela'."
Despite himself, Harry has to grin as Laura asks: "Are those even names? I mean, is it even legal to do such a thing to your child?"
Draco just shrugs, because Cora is still giggling to herself, and continues the game. When he has to draw a card, he immediately picks a snippet and crows a: "Time to get back to you!" at Cora. Harry feels like he hasn't said a single world for the whole duration of the game yet, because he is so baffled by Malfoy acting like... yeah, well, a decent human being.
"Cora, do you sing in the shower? And dear, we've been living together for a whole year, there's no way you will be talking your way out of this!"
Cora nudges him with his elbow, but Malfoy doesn't even attempt to hide his smile as she admits: "Yeah well, "The 80s Very Best Disco Ballads" is a very catchy tune, okay?" and quickly continues the game. It comes apparent very quickly that Harry's luck is just a tiniest bit better than everybody else's, but to his reluctance, this just means there are more questions directed at him:
"Harry, what is your favourite smell?"
"Uhm, Wood, I guess."
"Have you ever stolen a street sign?"
"Why would I... wait, no."
The game is amusing, but Harry realises soon that there are more serious questions to come when Laura asks Malfoy: "Luke, if you were another person, would you be friends with you?"
Ignoring Harry's burning stare, Malfoy looks at a spot on the table for some time and moves his head from left to right a little. It's not silent in the room, there's music from Cora's Laptop playing in the background and voices from the flat above them, but Harry feels like he can hear the seconds ticking by on the clock as he waits for Malfoy's answer. After some time, Malfoy draws in a deep breath and says: "I don't really know. Depends on when I got to know me I guess.", his gaze wanders over the table and locks with Harry's, "I suppose I behaved like a snob, who didn't care for anybody beside himself, for a fair amount of my life, and I still can be ignorant sometimes, but I think I have learned how to be... a friend at uni. And I think I would at least give me a chance, once I discovered there's more to me."
The smile that follows is tiny, yet the bravest thing Harry has ever seen Malfoy do. He keeps his eyes on Harry's for a little longer, as if to make a point, then moves on and acts like this confession was nothing out of the ordinary. Harry leans back in his chair and notices a lump in his throat before the realisation kicks in:
This was a plea from Malfoy to give him a second chance.
To reevaluate his opinion of him, because that is what Malfoy did with his.
He swallows and thinks of his Hogwarts days. If someone from his Divination class would have told him, he'd seen him play card games with Draco Malfoy, and he was about to change his opinion of him entirely, he would have laughed them in the face and told them to go back inhaling incense in Trelawny's tearoom.
But right now, he starts to believe his decision to come to uni and meeting Malfoy there by chance maybe was a wink from the stars, to tell him once and for all to stop placing people in boxes.
Harry is so absorbed in his trail of thoughts, he startles when Laura suddenly says: "Harry? Are you still in there?"
"Yes. What? Yes.", he shakes his head and quickly grins at her. "Uh. What was the question?"
"I asked 'What is the least favourite thing about yourself?'", Laura repeats.
"Oh, that's easy. My scar.", Harry replies on autopilot and points to his forehead.
"What?", Cora asks, "Your scar? But why? It's shaped like a lightning bolt! I mean, does it come any cooler?"
Harry raises his eyebrows at her. "Cool? Not so much, since it's where Vol-"
Potter! He meets Malfoy's eyes and feels a flicker of panic die in his eyes. What is he doing? What does he tell Cora now? Malfoy just slowly shakes his head as if Harry literally is the biggest idiot he's ever met.
"Uh, I mean, my scar often hurts. I got it my whole life and I used to get really bad headaches from it and so on, so, yeah. Not so very cool.", he smiles sheepishly at Cora and hopes he saved the situation. Malfoy seemingly breathes a sigh of relief and just mutters something to himself.
"Oh, okay.", Cora just replies and continues to play the game. Harry's thoughts drift off to Malfoy's behaviour and the dilemma he's currently in once again, until he hears a Potter! Seriously, watch yourself! and Cora asks him the next question: "Harry, were you named after anyone?"
"Yeah, well, I got my middle name from my father, but otherwise... well, I wouldn't know, since my parents are dead, would I?"
Cora's mouth immediately turns down and her eyes get wide. She reaches out and touches Harry's hand. "Oh, Harry, I'm so sorry."
Harry smiles weakly at her and shrugs. "Yeah, it's okay, it's not as if everybody didn't know what happened."
Cora just furrows her brows in confusion. "Harry? How would I know?"
"Come on, it was all over the papers how-", Malfoy coughs very loudly. Harry immediately bites his tongue, because he know he slipped again, and from Malfoy's gaze he won't get any further help this time either: It's downright murderous, with flaring nostrils narrowed brows.
"Uhm, I mean, they died. In an accident. It was a big story back then, but I should have figured you wouldn't know. Sorry."
Lying isn't exactly one of Harry's expertises, so Cora's expression is less than convinced as she withdraws her hand. Trying to cover up his uneasiness, Harry decides to take a sip from his drink and smile smoothly at Laura.
"Would you excuse us for a moment?", Malfoy suddenly pipes up and Harry nearly misses his mouth with his glass. Exploiting his startledness, Malfoy drags Harry away by his elbow, but smiles at Cora as if the tables were turned. Harry suspects it to be some secret sign between them, but before he can ask what's going on, Malfoy pushes him into the bathroom, locks the door with the key and whispers: "Muffliato."
"Isn't this illegal?", Harry asks with his chin jutted forward and arms crossed in front of him as Malfoy turns around again in the bathroom that is far too small for two people.
The roll of Malfoy's eyes is nearly unrecognisable in the dark of the night, but Harry doesn't want to turn the light on.
"What do you think will happen?", Malfoy sneers, "One of your friends from the ministry will turn up in a Muggle flat after setting up a floo to our kitchen stove to arrest me for casting a spell that indicates I want to have some privacy?
Besides, don't think I haven't seen your wand under your sleeve as well."
Malfoy's gaze is as provoking as it was back in school, and Harry remembers the white hot fury and anger and then terrible panic shooting through his body the last time the two of them met in a bathroom.
"Why, did you want to duel me without it?"
He feels like he has learned nothing since then when he draws his wand and looks Malfoy dead in the eye, thinking Go on then. with a stubbornness his godfather would have been proud of.
Knowing Malfoy, he doesn't avoid his glare and his nostrils begin flaring dangerously as he curls his lip into the cruel expression Harry has last seen on his father's face.
Seconds tick by on Cora's teacup clock on the wall, until Malfoy pushes Harry's shoulders out of the way to sit down on the bathtub and sigh: "Merlin, Potter, I didn't take you here to duel you."
Sitting down on the closed loo opposite of Malfoy himself, Harry takes in Malfoy as he sits there, long lean frame hunched to hide his mouth behind his hands with his arms propped up on his knees. This Malfoy doesn't quite fit in the two images Harry has of him: This is not Draco Malfoy, an influential father's only son and school bully, and this is not Draco Malfoy, the boy whose loyalty's power he had underestimated his entire life. Malfoy is not here to bully him, he's come to London an entire year before Harry even thought about it, but Harry is still wary of any sign of kindness he shows towards Cora or the others, for there is no trust he can build the relationship he is going to need to have to Malfoy – being roommates for an entire year – on.
When he meets Malfoy's gaze again, his face is hard. "You need to be more careful, Potter."
Harry nods. "I know."
"No, you don't." There's contained fury in the way Malfoy let's his palm slap straight on his thigh. "You don't have any idea what it's like in the least. Go a year without magic? Oh, you don't have to. But you need to understand that you're nothing special here. I thought you grew up with Muggles, you should know how to behave like one when you decide to leave the Wizarding World behind for-"
"Do you think it was an easy decision?", Harry exclaims with balled fists on his thighs, "Do you honestly think that after growing up with Muggles who hated me and treated me like dirt for the better part of my life, I would go leave the Wizarding World behind if it wasn't absolutely necessary?"
"Well then imagine what I'm doing here as someone who's been told since birth that any contact with Muggles should be avoided at all costs!"
Malfoy's squinting at him like he wants to rip off his glasses and throw them out of the window in an instant, while the blood is pounding in Harry's ears and he tries to look as frightening as possible in the angry state he's in. During their screaming, they have leaned ever closer together, so that it would hurt now, should one decide to punch the other.
"Then please explain to me", Harry presses out through gritted teeth with all his bottled-up sarcasm, "how come Draco Malfoy, son of wizard elite and one of the most promising Hogwarts' graduates of his year, is wasting away his time at a Muggle University?"
Harry expects Malfoy to go ballistic at that, maybe even punch or hex him, and it's not that Harry wants it, it's just that Malfoy's mere presence gets him so riled up he can't help himself but tantalise.
To his surprise, Malfoy does neither, and simply looks at Harry with something close to pity in his eyes as he says: "When I said: 'The same as you, I guess.', I meant it. Or what are you doing here but hiding?"
Harry's fist unclench immediately by his surprise at being found out this easily. Malfoy can't have known the way the press is hunting him down and the people are throwing themselves at him wherever he goes. If he has been here for a whole year, he couldn't have read the Prophet, and Harry doubts he would know from first-hand experience. Or does he? Just maybe... The other way round?
Malfoy watches the thought sink in on Harry's face until he continues: "And this is why I need this to work." He leans forward again to tackle Harry's gaze. "We don't mention Hogwarts. We went to normal schools, with normal subjects and normal friends. If you want to tell stories, alter them so they're credible for anybody who's never touched a wand. And stick with the car accident story, okay?" He flicks his finger against Harry's scar and shoots his eyebrows at him to make his point clear.
Harry nods with a grunt. There really isn't much of a choice left for him, after all.
This is the moment Cora chooses to knock on the bathroom door and ask: "Guys? Is everything okay in there?"
Malfoy flicks his wand to end the Muffliato. "Yeah, sure, we'll be back in a minute.", he says with all the tension gone from his voice, and Harry wonders how he manages to go from threatening to furious to carefree in so little time. Maybe it's something Muggles are good at. Maybe he can learn, too.
"Oh, and one thing else.", Malfoy adds when his gaze has once again settled on Harry, "Hands off Cora. I see how you're ogling her when she's talking to me. I know she's a great person, but she'll continue to be one without you making her your next challenge."
He gets up and leaves Harry sitting there in his complete confusion, and only stops at the door to turn around one last time and throw a heated glance at him. "Don't mess this up, Potter. Merlin knows you did with a lot of my life."
Harry swallows and sighs, but stays in the dark bathroom. This certainly isn't how he imagined the first day of college, but now that he's there, he isn't even sure if he imagined anything in particular at all. It's just that now all the blurry frames of future experience are filled with a face he thought he would forget come time and will now never be able to get out of his mind.
Not exactly one of the cliffhangers I'm usually so fond of, I know, but I felt like I had to start this story slowly.
(Don't worry, by the way, Harry doesn't have the hots for Cora. I do. I love her. But I guess we can all tell Harry's interest lies somewhere else.)
Also, I don't have an obsession with Draco being a girl, but if anyone should stumble across this post on tumblr:
post/83003260010/no-but-what-if-draco-had-really-been-a-girl-though - Yeah, that was me as well. xxx